Healing
by Defiled Ladel
Summary: There are times when life takes everything away from you. And sometimes the only thing that can make the heart hurt less is time.


**A.N: I know I'm supposed to be working on other things but this wouldn't leave me alone.**

**Tell me what you think.**

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I'm here again. Two times in a week, a new record.

I don't know why I keep coming back, it's not like she even knows I'm here. And I know it's only a matter of time until someone checks my room to find me gone. They know where to look by now. I never go anywhere else.

To think that all the wonderful things she has done, all the people she has saved, all the lives she unknowingly helped. And here is her reward.

A cold slab of solid marble. The words 'loving wife, mother and friend' etched in the stone only stand to show me what I have lost.

I knew eventually one of was going to leave the other. I always thought we would go together, fighting until our last breaths. She put up a fight. My green eyed goddess wouldn't leave without a good fight, but there is only so much fight when your body is trying to kill you.

They told me it was an internal bleed. My strong, warrior wife dies by internal bleeding. And they have the gall to say they were 'sorry'. The words mean as little as the ones on the stone in front of me. If I hear another person tell me they are 'sorry for my loss' or 'It will get better' I may just show them how wrong they are.

She was taken from me after giving me the best gift in the world.

The days after were the hardest. I just couldn't pick her up. What sort of father can't pick up their own child? She is the last living thing I have left of my wife and I can't bring myself to touch her without sobbing uncontrollably.

She looks just like her. Emeralds for eyes and short tufts of red hair, with the fair skin if her mother. How cruel can the world be when it gives me a replica of the women it just took from me.

Whenever I look into those eyes all I see is her. And that's as good it's going to get.

To say I was a recluse was an understatement. My life consisted of looking after my daughter and attempting to look after myself. That didn't work out so well. Ruby tells me that she found me sleeping with my child crying on my chest, on the day she came to visit. And since that day for the next six months, she and the rest of my friends made it their mission to help me.

There was only one good thing to come out of it. I got time to visit my wife. They told me the service was beautiful. I didn't go. Who wants to see the women they love lowered into the ground while you hold the last piece of your love in your hands? I spent that day making sure my little girl was okay.

And for the first time a few months after they buried my wife I found reason to smile again. My last vestige of light spoke her first word. 'Da'. That one word was my saving grace. She knew who I was, my little girl knew me. The little voice in my head told me she would never know her mother, I knew she would never meet her mother but she will know who she was.

Over the weeks and months that followed I found myself making the attempt to live again. I would wash myself without someone asking me to, I would eat without prompt and I would make sure my daughter had the father she deserved.

I would sometimes at night find myself by my wife's side. Telling her all about my day. Telling her what her daughter's smile looks like, what her laugh sounds like. I would tell her the new word she learnt, how long she managed to sit up until falling over and giggling to herself. But no matter how many good things that came out of my mouth, one thing was on repeat. 'Why can't you be here to see this?'.

I tried to make do with what I had. But there comes a time when you need a mother instead of a father. Boyfriends, feelings and periods were some of the things I couldn't handle. She didn't need me for those moments. She had 5 aunts for those times, and for the times when she needed her father I was there to help her through it.

Ever since I told her stories of her mother she wanted to be just like her. The strong, loving and fun women I knew from memory stood before me, she just had my brain. She wanted to help people, and as soon as she could, made her way through Signal and eventually Beacon.

I spent more time by myself during those years then I would have liked. The others had lives to live as well. They would drop by every now and then to 'catch up' but I knew why they would come. 'Catch up' was synonymous with 'make sure you haven't done something stupid' and I could understand the concern. Me alone was not a situation they were comfortable with.

But as the years flew by, the visits became few and far between and eventually they became a gentle trickle. Coming to celebrate birthdays, holidays and to pay our respects to those who couldn't be with us.

My daughters return from Beacon was a sight. She left the brave go getter I raised and came back a woman we could all be proud of. And the day she told me she was getting married to the boy she met at initiation I smiled to myself, how much of her life had I been on the other end of.

And now here I stand. In front of my only love silently hesitant over the next steps in the life I will lead. I've been here twice this week not for any other reason than to think. I can only hope that my daughter doesn't take after me. I can only silently wish for her to live her life in the arms of her husband, I can only wish she never has to feel the loss of losing her love so young.

I know if Pyrrah was here now she would smile at me and say 'I'm so proud of you my love' and if the day is nice enough I can feel her warm hand in mine.

A warm hand rests on my shoulder. They are getting quicker. I turn and see the familiar red cloaked women who has helped me through the best and worst days in my life. Her smile is small and with tears in her eyes she brings me into a small hug.

"She would be so proud of you Jaune." Her voice is thick and hoarse from her tears.

"I hope so. I really hope so." I hadn't noticed my tears until they pooled on the fabric resting on my cheek.

Ruby pulls back and gives me a wide smile and takes my large callused hand in hers before tugging me back to the house.

"Let's get going grandpa, there is somebody Peony wants you to meet."

There are times when life takes everything away from you. And sometimes the only thing that can make the heart hurt less is time.

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**A.N: So there it is, somewhat darker than I normally write.**

**I hope it was alright.**

**(Peony flowers mean healing and I saw it fitting for a baby name.)**


End file.
